Freedom’s Spirit (Galatians 3:1-5)
On June 23, 2001, the Boeing company finished a labor of love—the complete restoration of the last existing 307 Stratoliner. It was the world’s first pressurized commercial airliner.
A New York company used a vintage loom to reproduce the original Pan Am wall fabric. An interior company put in the flooring, carpeting, and paneling. They even imported Scottish leather for the single-aisle and crew seats. All the light fixtures, bulkheads, and trims were manufactured from original engineering drawings. Everything was done to perfection.
Six months later the aircraft crash-landed in Seattle’s Elliot Bay. Were there problems with the ancient engines? Did the dated tail and wing controls fail? No, they worked without a hitch.
The problem was an operator error; the crew had failed to refuel the engines. (Stuart Bond, Gig Harbor, Washington; source: komotv.com)
I’m afraid that’s the way many Christians try to live their lives. They forget the fuel that makes it all work, and then they wonder why they crash and burn.
The question is: How do we live the Christian life without crashing? How do we maintain a dynamic spiritual vitality without burning out? In other words, how do we get the fuel to fly spiritually?
Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Galatians 3, Galatians 3, where the Bible asks six pointed questions which give us the answer.
Galatians 3, starting at vs.1 You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? (lit., Who has given you the evil eye?) Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. (NIV)
Paul says to these Galatian Believers, “I showed you that Christ died for our sins. He is the one that paid the penalty, but now you are behaving like you’re under a spell. By trying to keep a law to pay for your own sins, you act like somebody gave you the evil eye and erased your brain.”
“Who did this to you?” Paul asks as his first question. “Who has bewitched you?”
And then, just in case our minds were actually erased, he asks us a second question to remind us how we got started in our lives with the Spirit.
vs.2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? (NIV)
The obvious answer is we received the Holy Spirit by believing the Gospel, not by trying to keep the law. The moment we put our faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit came to live within each and every one of us.
That’s how we got started in the Christian life. We began with a simple faith in Christ who loved us and died for us.
In her memoirs, Ilyasah Shabazz, the third daughter of Malcolm X and Betty Shabazz, talks about the effect of attending church as a little girl:
Betty Shabazz took her girls to the mosque every Sunday, and when they were visiting their grandparents in Philadelphia, they went to Friendship Baptist, a church Ilyasah says she loved, especially the praying and testifying and the singing of gospel music. “I loved the singing that went on,” she writes. “I wanted to feel whatever powerful force was causing all of these people to sing and clap so heartily. I never did catch the spirit, but I always kept the hope.” (Quoted by Elsie Washington in Black Issues Book Review, May/June 2002, p. 57; www.PreachingToday.com)
Perhaps, that sentiment describes some of you. You’re looking for something different in your life, something that can change you from the inside out, something that will give you real joy on the inside.
Well, if that’s the case, then I’ve got good news for you. You don’t have to hope for it any longer. You can catch the Spirit today.
Just BEGIN YOUR LIFE WITH THE SPIRIT BY FAITH. SIMPLY TRUST CHRIST WITH YOUR LIFE AND STOP TRYING SO HARD. JUST DEPEND ON CHRIST AND HE WILL GIVE YOU HIS HOLY SPIRIT RIGHT NOW.
Nathaniel Hawthorne once described happiness as a butterfly, which, when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you sit down quietly, may alight upon you. It’s like that with the Spirit of God. He is not seized. He is received. (Ben Patterson, “A Faith Like Mary’s,” Preaching Today, Tape No. 87; www.PreachingToday.com)
If you want God’s Holy Spirit within, then stop trying to chase after Him; stop working so hard to get Him. Instead, simply receive Him by resting quietly in Christ. Begin your life with the Spirit by faith.
Then go on to COMPLETE YOUR LIFE WITH THE SPIRIT BY FAITH, as well. END LIKE YOU STARTED BY TRUSTING CHRIST WITH YOUR LIFE. FIND FULL AND COMPLETE MATURITY THROUGH DEPENDENCE ON CHRIST, NOT BY FOLLOWING A LIST OF RULES.
vs.3 Are you so foolish? – Paul’s 3rd question. After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? Or more literally, “are you now being perfected (or completed) by the flesh? – That’s question #4.
The Bible asks us a very simple question here: If we began our life with the Spirit by faith, are we going to complete it by our own human efforts? & The answer is quite obvious – NO! We end like we started –
by faith, by depending on the Lord, not ourselves.
If we want to find full and complete maturity as followers of Christ, then we must trust Christ to live His life through us by the Spirit He gave each and every one of us.
In a message at a Promise Keepers rally some time ago (August 11, 2000), Gordon MacDonald talked about his days of running track in prep school. His coach had invited Gordon to his home for dinner one night. And after the meal, he pulled out a notebook displaying Gordon’s name on the front cover. He immediately turned to the back page, which bore the heading “June 1957” – three and a half years away.
“Gordon,” he said. “These are the races I’m going to schedule you to run almost four years from now. Here are the times you will achieve.”
Gordon looked at those times and thought, “Impossible!” They were light years away from where he was at that moment as a runner.
Then the coach began turning back the pages of that book, page by page, showing the 42 months he had scheduled for workouts. They were the graduated, accelerated plans for Gordon’s increasing skill on the track as the months and years would go by. The coach had a sense of direction and development when it came to Gordon’s athletic growth. (Gordon MacDonald, from a message delivered at the Promise Keepers’ “Go the Distance” Conference, 8-11-00; www.PreachingToday.com)
And in the same way, God has a sense of direction and development when it comes to our spiritual growth. He has told us, “You are going to be like my Son, Jesus, someday” (Romans 8:29). & We think, “Impossible! That’s light years away from where we are at this moment.” But God has promised us, “I will complete the work I began in you” (Philippians 1:6).
All we need to do is trust our Coach. All we need to do is trust God’s Holy Spirit as He leads us through life.
He’s got some tough workouts planned for us. There are going to be some days when we hurt. But we can trust our Coach, because He really does know what He’s doing. He is working to make us more and more like Jesus Christ. & One day we will, in fact, be as beautiful and wonderful as He.
Trust the Lord to complete His work in you. & Finish your spiritual journey the same way you started it – by faith. Begin your life with the Spirit by faith. Complete your life with the Spirit by faith.
And CONTINUE YOUR LIFE WITH THE SPIRIT BY FAITH, as well. LIVE RIGHT NOW IN DEPENDENCE UPON THE LORD. TRUST HIM TO HELP YOU GROW EACH AND EVERY DAY even through times of suffering.
Verse 4 gives us a 5th question to think about. Have you suffered so much for nothing—if it really was for nothing? (NIV)
You see, when we live a life of faith, sometimes we suffer for it. Our old friends don’t always appreciate the new changes that are taking place in our lives. Sometimes, people get jealous and they begin to make life difficult for us, or they try to get us to go back to our old ways.
That’s what happened to these Galatian believers. When they came to faith in Christ, some of the Jewish religious leaders didn’t like the fact that Paul and Barnabas could gather bigger crowds than they. The religious leaders got real jealous and began to mistreat the new Galatian believers, lying about them and even throwing stones at their leaders (Acts 13 & 14).
Paul had to remind them in Acts 14, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). & Now Paul asks them, “Have you suffered so much for nothing?”
In other words, don’t give up the fight yet! Keep on living your life by faith in Christ, not somebody’s religious system. & Don’t let nobody or nothing stop you; otherwise, all your suffering will have been a waste.
A couple of years ago, Alec Holden of Great Britain, turned 100 and received $50,000. Ten years before that, when Holden was 90, he bet the equivalent of 200 US dollars that he would live to see 100. A betting company had placed Holden’s odds at 250–1, so on April 24, 2007, his 100th birthday, he collected his rightful earnings, totaling $50,000.
Holden, who worked as both a teacher and a carpenter throughout his life, credited porridge as his number one source of survival. He also confessed that in the days leading up to the big payoff, he was “very careful” and “frequently reminded himself ‘to keep breathing.’” (Associated Press, "Bet on century wins £25,000," www.guardian.co.uk, 4-24-07, and “Good Week for Incentives,” The Week, 5-4-07, p. 8; www.PreachingToday.com)
Good things come to those who wait. That’s true in the spiritual life as well. Sometimes we have to remind ourselves, “Keep trusting;” but if we do, we find ourselves all the “richer” for it.
So keep on believing, even through times of pain, because God abundantly supplies His Spirit to those who believe.
vs.5 Does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard? (NIV)
This is the 6th question, and the obvious answer is God gives us His Spirit because we believe, not because we obey the Law. It is through faith, and only through faith, that God gives us His Holy Spirit. & When we trust Him, God is not stingy with His Spirit.
The Greek word for “give” actually means to “give generously and extravagantly.” The word was used in Bible days to describe someone who paid for an entire chorus to provide background music in a play.
It was very expensive! It would be like hiring the entire Chicago Symphony Orchestra, instead of the Island Band, to provide background music for an anniversary reception at Carly’s – an extravagant expense, to say the least.
But that’s exactly how God supplies His Spirit to those of us who believe. He supplies His Holy Spirit with great, extravagant abundance!
On the advice of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell, the parents of Helen Keller sent for a teacher from the Perkins Institution for the Blind in Boston, Massachusetts. Anne Sullivan, a 19-year-old orphan, was chosen for the task of instructing 6-year-old Helen, who was deaf and blind. It was the beginning of a close and lifelong friendship between them.
By means of a manual alphabet, Anne "spelled" into Helen’s hand such words as doll or puppy. Two years later, Helen was reading and writing Braille fluently. At 10 Helen learned different sounds by placing her fingers on her teacher’s larynx and “hearing” the vibrations. Later Helen went to Radcliffe College, where Anne spelled the lectures into Helen’s hand.
After graduating with honors, Helen decided to devote her life to helping the blind and deaf. As part of that endeavor, she wrote many books and articles and traveled around the world making speeches. Since Helen’s speeches were not intelligible to some, Anne often translated them for her.
Their nearly 50 years of companionship ended when Anne died in 1936. Helen wrote these endearing words about her lifelong friend:
“My teacher is so near to me that I scarcely think of myself apart from her. I feel that her being is inseparable from my own, and that the footsteps of my life are in hers. All the best of me belongs to her—there is not a talent or an inspiration or a joy in me that has not been awakened by her loving touch.” (Helen Keller, The Story of My Life, Doubleday, 1954; www.Preaching Today.com)
That’s how God supplies His Holy Spirit to those of us who believe. He doesn’t just supply His Spirit for a lesson or two in good behavior. He supplies His Spirit as a life-long companion and close friend, as One who walks with us through every step of our lives.
Spiritually speaking, like Helen Keller, we were deaf and blind. But God’s Spirit came along side us when we trusted Christ. & Now, He is available to help us excel in this life. All we need to do is to continue trusting Him.
Begin your life with the Spirit BY FAITH. Complete your life with the Spirit BY FAITH. & Continue your life with the Spirit BY FAITH. From beginning to end, we live BY FAITH!
Faith is the key to the fuel tank of God’s Spirit. Faith is the key to living the Christian life without crashing and burning.
This is the secret of the holy,
Not our holiness, but HIM:
Jesus! empty us and fill us
With Thy fullness to the brim.
(Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations, #2231)
